American Civil War historiography and publishing blogged daily by Dimitri Rotov.

2/03/2009

Historian: Obama is reshaping Lincoln memories

A professor specializing in Civil War memory studies says that "... many may not realize that today’s president is shaping the way we remember the 16th president. Memory is always crafted by its contemporary context."

Many of us are old enough to remember how FDR's supporters appropriated Lincoln inadvertently launching a Lincoln publishing surge that eventually led to the still-running ACW boom. Both bonanzas had dire historiographic side effects, however...